Tour to highlight local ties to Civil War with stops at Burtner House, Penn Salt, other sites

Civil War buff Ruth McCartan believes some of the best history lessons lie close to home.

“You don’t have to go to a battlefield to learn,” the McCandless resident said.

McCartan will host a tour Sept. 13 of prominent Alle-Kiski Valley locations with significant ties to the Civil War, which lasted from 1861-1865 and ended slavery.

Tour highlights include the Burtner House in Harrison, Prospect Cemetery in Brackenridge, the Penn Salt row house in Natrona and Bull Creek Cemetery in West Deer.

The cost is $10, with proceeds split among the groups on the tour.

The Penn Salt Manufacturing Co., which sat along the Allegheny River, produced chemicals for home and industrial use.

The plant played an important role in producing products for the Civil War, World War I and World War II, said Bill Godfrey, president of the nonprofit Natrona Comes Together Association.

From 1850 to 1880, the company established a village for its workers that included 150 wooden cottages and brick homes. Godfrey said the houses were provided free to families of men who served in the war. Food was paid for with “Penn Salt dollars” to be spent in the company store.

The Natrona association in 2012 purchased the Gothic revival cottage at 34 Federal St. to preserve a piece of history. The tour will stop there for a glimpse into the past.

“It’s wonderful to show people a slice of life from that time,” he said. “This little house would have had mom, dad and six kids living here in four rooms.”

At Prospect Cemetery, 269 Civil War soldiers are buried at the 13-acre property.

Among them are James Mitchell, who participated in the funeral procession for Abraham Lincoln, and Samuel Norman, who survived the war and came home to Tarentum only to be shot and killed on Corbet Street while serving as a constable.

“I enjoy telling the stories of these soldiers,” cemetery director and historian Cindy Homburg said. “We have one man buried there who lived in Tarentum and, when he was killed, his family in Butler was notified by carrier pigeon.”

Homburg hosted a free event this summer to commemorate the 160th anniversary of the end of the war. More than 150 people attended — a testament to the significance of the cemetery’s historic connection, she said.

McCartan, a member of the Greater Pittsburgh Civil War Roundtable, has led Pittsburgh-based tours for a decade. She said her enthusiasm was stoked as a child during family trips to Gettysburg. She studied history at Edinboro University, now part of PennWest University, before a career in nursing.

McCartan said she also plans to talk about the 123rd Pa. Volunteer Infantry, which was formed on Pittsburgh’s North Side in 1862 and grew to include two companies from Natrona that served in the Union Army.

“I want to call people’s attention to the men that served from the Alle-Kiski Valley and what happened in the area that caused them to sign up,” she said.